MaXXXine Trailer Teases Mia Goth, Richard Ramirez, and a Completed Trilogy

Summary

• Check out the official trailer for
  MaXXXine
  . It’s the third installment in Ti West’s horror trilogy with Mia Goth following
  X
  and
  Pearl
  .
• Goth describes Maxine as a strong, determined survivor in
  MaXXXine
  , a Hollywood starlet facing a mysterious killer in the 1980s. The film references real-life events like the Richard Ramirez killings.
• The final installment of the planned trilogy,
  MaXXXine
  features an impressive cast and is set to premiere on July 4, 2024.

The first trailer for MaXXXine has been revealed. Written and directed by Ti West, the film is the third installment of the A24 horror movie trilogy that first began with the release of X in 2022. That was followed up with the prequel movie, Pearl, which was filmed back to back with the original, and production began on MaXXXine in mid-May of 2023. The film brings back franchise star Mia Goth for more bloody violence in an all-new decade. She appears alongside co-star Halsey in the trailer for the film, which can be watched above. It’s been a long time coming, ever since A24 shared a first-look image on May 1, 2023.

The cast for MaXXXine puts Goth in great company. Alongside her and Halsey, the film will star Elizabeth Debicki, Moses Sumney, Michelle Monaghan, Bobby Cannavale, Lily Collins, Kevin Bacon, and Giancarlo Esposito. Goth is serving as a producer on the film as well, alongside West, Jacob Jaffke, Kevin Turen, and Harrison Kreiss. The synopsis reads as follows:

In 1980s Hollywood, adult film star and aspiring actress Maxine Minx finally gets her big break. But as a mysterious killer stalks the starlets of Hollywood, a trail of blood threatens to reveal her sinister past.

Where MaXXXine Fits in with X and Pearl

The film is the third and possibly final installment of a planned movie trilogy. X is set in the late 1970s and tells the story of a small film crew producing an adult film on an elderly couple’s farm; the shoot is interrupted by the couple revealing themselves to be homicidal psychopaths. Mia Goth starred as both Maxine, an ambitious young performer, and Pearl, the withering murderess.

Its prequel, Pearl, dove back in time to 1918, following Goth as a younger version of the elderly killer in the first film. West had planned to make the prequel from the start and shot it secretly back to back with X before later announcing it to the public. That’s why Pearl was released in September 2022, just months after the March 2022 release of its predecessor. With MaXXXine, the franchise jumps forward after the events of X and finds Maxine closer to fame than ever.

And so we have a story of a fame-and-youth-obsessed young woman in 1918, whose disturbance persists into old age when she is triggered by a group of beautiful young adult film stars. She unleashes her trauma upon them, with only one survivor, young Maxine, who brings her horrors to Los Angeles. As MovieWeb’s Taryn Flaherty writes, “What happened to Pearl as a young woman shaped what happened to Maxine as a young woman, which will shape the way Maxine lives in MaXXXine.”

Maxine and the Night Stalker, Richard Ramirez

Filmmaker Ti West has revealed an interesting plot point of MaXXXine, and that’s its connection with the real-life serial killer Richard Ramirez, otherwise known as The Night Stalker. As such, the film will be a kind of murder mystery, with the fear and paranoia of The Night Stalker’s murders swirling around Maxine’s world. West told GamesRadar:

“It sets out a breadcrumb trail back to reality. It’s not just some big sweeping horror movie that’s purely for entertainment value.
It’s rooted in something
[…] ​​It has more in common with Summer of Sam, the Spike Lee movie, than it does Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood. It does play a significant role in the story but in its own particular way.”

The themes that West refers to here (when he says “it’s rooted in something”) seem to refer to the inherent violence that exists within sex, fame, and filmmaking. It’s what connects his trilogy to the Manson murders and the Black Dahlia murder (killing beautiful actresses) with the Richard Ramirez murders (multiple women around Los Angeles, where the Wonderland Murders had just happened). Let’s just hope the titular Maxine doesn’t turn out to be Ramirez’s victim, Maxine Levenia Zazzara, who was fearless in defending herself but was ultimately killed and mutilated in horrific fashion.

Ramirez won’t be the only connection to the real world, with MaXXXine having Easter Eggs that reference ’80s Hollywood and filmmaking in general. The Bates Motel on the Universal Studios backlot is set to play a part in the film, which is appropriate given that Psycho is often considered the first slasher film, and West’s trilogy is a deconstruction of slashers (and the male gaze they often titillate).

Mia Goth Sees MaXXXine ‘As a Superhero Movie’

Whatever happens to Maxine in the new film, one thing’s for sure — Mia Goth will slay. She has always been a great actor (see A Cure for Wellness and Nymphomaniac), but West’s trilogy has given her the opportunity to dig deeper than ever before. The results have been Herculean performances, which is apt, considering Goth sees her character as an extremely strong quasi-superhero.

“I see MaXXXine as a superhero movie – that’s how I read the script,” Goth has said of how she approached this third film in the X universe, via GamesRadar. “Maxine, as a character, has come a long way. She’s a survivor, she’s gone through a lot. When we meet her again, in this new world that she’s in, she’s really fought for everything that she has, and she’s not about to give that up.”

Goth added:

She’s going to fight for what she has. She’s a badass. There’s a strength to her. And she’s a really proactive, determined, focused woman. She goes after what she wants, and she’s not really going to take no for an answer.

All we know is that Maxine has been through way too much to let anyone stand in her way following the deadly events that occurred in X. MaXXXine will hit theaters on July 4th weekend, fitting for the film’s themes of the American Dream and bombastic Hollywood fame. You can watch a previously released teaser trailer below.